What does China’s past mean for its and your future as China once again becomes the most powerful nation on earth?

William C. Kirby and Peter K. Bol

How is a civilization built and sustained over millennia?  How are political systems supported or undermined by cultural, economic, and ecological challenges?  How does the need for shared values in a nation compete with individual interest and creativity?

These concepts are common to humankind, but nowhere on Earth are they more in evidence than in the story of the longest, continuous civilization in human history, China, home to one-fifth of mankind.... Read more about Power and Civilization: China (Gen Ed 1136)

How do patterns of American economic, political, and social inequality shape our policy responses to working families, immigration, and poverty?

Theda Skocpol and Mary Waters

In a period of contentious politics, Americans are debating fundamental issues about economic wellbeing, social justice, and the state of our democracy. How can the nation expand opportunity and security for workers and families following years of rising socioeconomic inequalities and shifts in the relationship of families to work?... Read more about American Society and Public Policy (Gen Ed 1092)

How does social change happen?

Cass Sunstein

How does change happen? When, why, and how do people, and whole nations, come to together to influence large-scale policies and actions on issues like the environment, equality, criminal justice? Why do revolutions occur? This course will try to answer these questions, and do so by exploring a diversity of efforts related to societal change.... Read more about Making Change When Change Is Hard: the Law, Politics, and Policy of Social Change (Gen Ed 1102)

Why does America love guns?

Caroline Light

The U.S. comprises 5% of the world’s population but holds approximately 40% of the world’s guns. We also experience more gun-related deaths than any economically comparable nation.... Read more about Guns in the U.S.: A Love Story (Gen Ed 1073)

What are you willing to do for the health of others?

Richard Lee

Heart diseases have killed occasional humans since ancient times, but only in the past century have heart diseases become epidemic throughout the world. In fact, the first description of a heart attack in a human was not until 1912.... Read more about The Global Heart Disease Epidemic: Stopping What We Started (Gen Ed 1053)

What makes us human and why does it matter?

Joseph Henrich

What makes us psychologically and behaviorally human? Why is this important? In what ways are humans similar to other species, and how are we different? What are the evolutionary origins of the behavioral and psychological features found across human societies, including parental love, sibling rivalry, pair-bonding, incest aversion, social status, war, norms, altruism, religion, language and cooking?... Read more about Human Nature (Gen Ed 1056)

If we want to understand our own history we need to look at the fringes, in this case the ongoing tensions and violence at the U.S.-Mexico border illustrates what we value and fear as a society.

Gabriela Soto Laveaga

Our southern border is continuously covered in newspapers, social media, and political debates. Why does the Mexico-U.S. border continue to be a space of discussion and controversy? In the twenty-first century, as nations across the world militarize or rebuild their borders, the U.S.-Mexico border serves as a vital case study to understand the ongoing trend of tightening national borders—it also allows us to better understand our own history, politics, and how we shape our view of the world.... Read more about The Border: Race, Politics and Health in Modern Mexico (Gen Ed 1089)